Outdoor Classroom 2022

Hi, I'm Tanya Muhammad. I am the CEO of Daycare Chronicles 101 Consulting, Inc. I have been a daycare provider for over 30 years. I have created an online course, how to open and operate a family daycare facility. I have the only hotline, especially just for daycare providers. It's the Daycare Chronicles 101 hotline. I have a podcast, a YouTube channel. I can be found at daycarechronicles101.com or 1-888-679-4034. Don't be afraid to bring your indoor classroom outdoors. You can set up your learning centers, your reading center, your writing center, your math center, your sensory, everything that you can do indoors, you can do outside as well. Being outside encourages more opportunity for creative play and activity. Remember when you were little and you would be with your family and your cousins, you're outside playing, and you didn't have all of these gadgets that they have today. Just the amount of creativity and imagination. I recall my sister having an imaginary playmate and we would be outside playing and this playmate would be a part of what we were doing as well. By bringing your classroom outdoors, trust me, the children will appreciate it. They will have so many more memories than just sitting in the classroom. Okay? So bring those babies on outside. Let's have a good time. Have you ever brought your library outdoors? Oh yes, you can do that. For your outdoor classroom design, contact Daycare Chronicles 101. That's what I'm here for. How to create your learning centers outdoors. Let's start with your art center. Some paper, some paint, some Play-Doh, some markers, just some art supplies. Bring those things outdoors. Set you up a table outside or you can even roll it, roll it out on the carpet. You know, you can set those things down. It doesn't have to be rocket science. Make it simple. Make it easy for yourself. Even have the children bring those items outside to have them be engaged in the process as well. Your sensory centers. Water play. We all do water play. You know, we care for children. You have water play. You have, you have the rocks, you have grass, kinetic sand, mud, leaves, you know, falling from the tree. This, this all is sensory right here. My favorite is the yoga and meditation. Have the children purchase yoga mats. My parents purchased yoga mats and they loved it. The children, we do yoga twice a week. We do meditation, get the little emoji cushions or something for them to sit on. Bring them outside, put them under a tree, put them in the grass. It's okay to be with nature and don't put your fears of bugs and animals that are outside insects on the children. Don't do that. They will have a wonderful, wonderful time. Nature is a part of life. The sun, the wind, the trees, you know, you may have fruit trees in your yard. Your backyard is, can be a wonderful oasis for the children. So this is just one way that you can create your learning centers outdoors. Hey everybody. Today is our paint and create party. The tables and chairs were supplied by my daughter's party supply company, a party supplies. Yes it is. I have the easels. I have some that have the pictures on them where they can paint those. We all, this was like pretty much Oriental trading and Michaels and this was Amazon. The let's paint sign. The backdrop photo was from my daughter, her party supply company. I just want the children to have a wonderful time today. I am so excited about it all. So, and let me tell you, even dress the part y'all. Okay. Paint and create. I wanted y'all to see today's setup. I, um, I took some cups and I put the little apple juice and juice boxes in there. Um, little things for the children. We're going to be out here doing water play and it's hot. So if they want to get a snack or something, they can. It's here for them. Yes it is. We're having the step to water play day. Happy Friday. When it comes to your outdoor classroom and your daily setups, you have to be intentional. Pick a theme. Maybe you want to do, you know, the postal worker. So you, you know, you do a whole mailboxes, you'd get the little, um, mail carrier bags, you get the uniform, and then you have the children write letters, postcards or whatever. You can kind of do it that way. That's just one of the things that you can do. Be intentional about it and look at it from a child's view. You know, when, when you're doing this, creating, think about the children. What are they going to get out of this? What are they going to see? Get down on your knees and see what they see so that you will make sure that you are being very intentional in what you're trying to get across to them and make it very inviting. I know that my daycare children, they just love when they come out and they see a whole daily setup. When we did the mail carrier, I had a whole post office, a little pop-up post office. It was like super cute. They were so excited. We have the UPS uniform. We have the mail carrier uniform. They just had a wonderful time. So just make it fun, be intentional and make a point to look at it from a child's view. This week's theme is the post office week, the letter M, the number 13. Okay. So we have our pop-up post office, super cute. Amazon, y'all $39.99. The windows roll up, the doors roll up. There's a back entrance. And then we have our table here with all the supplies that you will see at the post office as well as our little mail carrier, Mike the mail carrier book and puppet. We have our mailbox. Okay. Just going to have some fun this week and I got a little twist on the ad to it too. Y'all. Okay. Look at the little sign. Oh my goodness. And then we have our mail carrier poster pack here. So we have pictures to show them what actually happens at the post office and what mail carriers do and the different type of mailboxes that you may see. And of course we have the mail carrier costume. Okay. Here's a video of the outdoor classroom. Welcome to my outdoor classroom. Here's a video of actually my grandson and this is how you develop language through play. Let's talk about the language that's developed through play. What are those days? What's that? What is it? Banana? Yes. What's this one? Mm. What's this one? Chicken. Yay. Yes. It's hot. Okay. Okay. It's hot. It's going to melt. Yes. Yes. Oh my goodness. When you love what you do, you invest in what you do and just let them be. Don't overtake their play. Watch and learn. So here's some pictures of ideas for your outdoor classroom. Um, the first photo here, you see they've taken some chalk and some paint and they've just created a design on the concrete. You can have your mud kitchen there. You can have your acrylic paint out there where it's double sided, where the children can see. That's always a lot of fun for them. And then you have your sensory area. They've taken just some tires and just added some rocks and some trucks to it. And it's just absolutely wonderful. Then you have your music wall, your outdoor music wall, which is household items. So these are just some ideas for your outdoor classroom. So here's a slide of the outdoor yoga and meditation classes that we have at my facility. The children love, love, love to do yoga and meditation. They love having their own personal yoga mats. They love being outside. You get to feel the sun or the wind. You get to hear the bees, the trees, you know, the birds, everything. And so it's just a wonderful way to teach children to calm down. And yoga does not have to be boring. We shake our sillies out and do everything on our yoga mats, but it's just teaching the children another way to calm themselves, to relax because even though our lives are just busy, busy, busy, so are theirs. Thank you for coming. And I can't wait to see what you do with yours. To book Ms. Tanya, please visit my website, www.daycarechronicles101.com.